Slain prof demanding, caring
by Mary Bustamante on Dec. 07, 2006, under Education, LocalMac Eugene Hadley’s dedication recalled during memorial service
Mac Eugene Hadley a self self-admitted gruff guy, loved camping and fishing and often went out to gather reptiles for his experiments.
Mac Eugene Hadley was more than the consummate scientist, although he certainly was that, his colleagues say.
The professor emeritus from the University of Arizona, killed last month in an apparent home burglary, was a demanding but caring educator who instilled his own boundless dedication to science in his students.
Hadley, 76, was a doting husband, father and grandfather who took family members on countless vacations for fun and to expand their horizons.
The self-admitted gruff guy, loved camping and fishing and often went out to gather reptiles for his experiments.
“One time when we told him there was a rattlesnake in our path when we were out walking, said grandson Tommy Spevak, all he said was, ‘Did you catch it?’
Hadley was the author of a popular textbook, “Endocrinology,” which his wife, Trudy, patiently typed for him.
“His enthusiasm and energy were infectious and procrastination was not in his dictionary,” according to the program at his memorial service Wednesday, which was attended by more than 100 family members, friends and colleagues of the man who taught and conducted research for 40 years at UA.
Some of his first UA research, into pigmentation of amphibians, led him to studies of pigmentation in human beings and efforts to prevent skin cancer by finding a way for skin to become tan without using the sun.
During that research at the UA College of Medicine, he discovered hormones that not only enhance skin pigmentation but also enhance sexual function in men and women.
“I wish I had a tape recording of his account of his unexpected erection” after he injected himself with the hormones he was researching, said Robert S. McCuskey, professor emeritus and former department head of cell biology and anatomy at UA.
The unanticipated side effect lasted 24 hours, his colleagues said.
“Sometimes an overdose can be a good thing,” McCuskey said, to laughs from the crowd.
Many of them had already heard the story from Hadley.
Regents professor emeritus Victor J. Hruby from the UA department of chemistry, said nearly 60 companies also are interested in how some of his work affects feeding behavior, including obesity, wasting disease, anorexia and diabetes.
Molecules he developed are used in research for treating melanoma, Hruby said.
“It’s really tragic that Mac will not be around to see some of the potential applications of these molecules, but we will go on. We will succeed. We know, Mac, you’d expect us to,” he said.
Hruby and others said it was a “tremendous gift” to see Hadley early on the day he died. Hadley was at a meeting that day about getting back into research.
Former student Zalfa Abdel-Malek, now president of the International Federation of Pigment Cell Studies, said it was Hadley who accepted her as a graduate student and worked her and others “to death” to get the results he needed in the lab. But he also worked that hard himself, she said.
“He’d be the first one in the lab in the morning, washing beakers because he said, ‘I’m never going to have you say you can’t do your experiments because the glassware is dirty,’” she said. Later he’d bring his daughter, Martha, in to do the washing.
Other former students also talked about how Hadley and his wife, Trudy, would invite them into their home and spur them on to succeed. He was a true mentor, they said.
